“Like hell you will!” A hand settled on Mitch’s shoulder and with a single yank, Mitch was three feet away and Shelby was blinking up at Cody. His mouth was twisted, his eyes wild. He looked ready to pummel someone. Not to mention, incredibly sexy in his Stetson, Western top, and jeans that hugged every impressive part of him.
Cody Tucker, down and dirty cowboy, had returned.
She should yell at him for butting in, be mad that he hadn’t let her handle Mitch on her own, but there was something about him, like this, that made her hot. The right kind of hot. Shelby had never felt so turned on and so irritated in all her life.
“That, my friend, was a mistake,” Mitch said, stepping forward, his fists rolling tight.
Cody treated Mitch like an annoying gnat, instead pinning Shelby with a single look. “What do you think you’re doing?”
“Me?” she said loudly. “Not that it’s any of your business, but I was—”
“She was just dancing,” Logan interrupted her, coming up beside Cody and placing a restraining hand on his arm. “It’s what people do when they’re at a bar. In fact, it was what you were coming over to do when you saw Shelby already had a partner. Then you decided to remember your Southern manners and wait your turn.”
“She didn’t seem too happy with her partner.” Cody crossed his arms over his chest. “And I hate waiting.”
“She seemed to be liking it just fine to me. Actually, she just agreed to go back to my place and cool off.” Mitch sent her a sly smile, implying all kinds of things and taking a sudden step forward. Cody did the same. “So looks like you’re going to be waiting a long time.” Mitch could not have dragged out the last two words any longer if he tried.
“That is not what I said.” Shelby tried to squeeze between the two men, knowing full well that Cody would stop her. And when his hand came back to grip her hip, effectively holding her in place, little tingles shot straight to her core.
“Really?” Gina sang with pleased surprise, finally showing up to rescue Shelby and wearing a hunk of a cowboy on her arm. Logan glared at the guy. “Shell was considering a night of hot sex . . . with a stranger?”
“No.” Shelby glared at her friends. “I was telling Mitch that—”
“He’s going home—alone.” Cody’s nostrils flared as he closed the remaining distance.
“Not going to happen, Cody.” Logan wedged himself between the two men. A second later and he would have taken a fist to the head. “You too, buddy. Take some advice and go find yourself someone else to dance with.” Logan then took a long look at Gina wrapped around her cowboy and frowned. “Actually, partner, you can leave too.”
“He leaves, I leave,” Gina clarified, wrapping herself tighter around her man. Logan frowned.
“Or we could take this outside,” Mitch said and suddenly Shelby noticed that two very large, very serious guys were at Mitch’s back.
“Let’s go then.” Cody locked on Mitch.
“That is so lame,” Gina finished.
It was lame. Shelby didn’t want to be the cause of all of this and she was angry that these guys were putting her in that place. Even angrier that she was letting them. Sure, she had been a little nervous before, but she was dealing with the situation just fine. “Look, just knock it off, I’m going—”
“Let’s say we all go shoot a game of pool. Next round’s on me.” When no one budged, Logan pulled out his badge. “Or I can haul your asses off to jail, come back and enjoy myself a nice cold beer, in silence. Your choice.”
Mitch took in the badge, looked at Shelby and with a shrug he walked off, deciding she wasn’t worth it. Not that Shelby wanted Mitch, or God forbid, a fight, but that he just fled when faced with a tiny badge made her feel a little deflated and a lot angry.
“Hey, what about judging? It’s a great way to get to know people,” Shelby called after Mitch.
Crap.
She turned her anger on Cody. “You just lost me a judge!”
“Sue me.”
“Now—” Logan slapped Cody on the back. “Weren’t you fixin’ to ask Shelby something?”
Shelby raised a brow, waiting for an apology. He’d ruined her week, and now her night, not to mention, he’d cost her a judge, the
only
judge she’d managed to secure and she wanted him to say he was sorry. Childish or not, she deserved to hear him grovel. Then she’d go back to Gina’s, take a cold shower, make a list of hopeful judges, and figure out why a fleeting touch from Cody packed more heat than an entire dance with a sexy man.
“We need to talk,” he barked.
“Excuse me?”
“Christ, Cody,” Logan scolded. “Are you really this bad with women or are you trying to piss her off?” He turned toward Shelby. “He actually wanted to ask you to dance.”
Shelby looked at Cody. “Is that true?”
“Yes.”
“And here I thought you were going to apologize for acting like a jerk.”
“Because I stopped some guy from putting his fucking hands all over you?”
“His hands weren’t all over me.” Well, he was kind of grabby, but that wasn’t the point. “And he agreed to judge the cook-off. Now, thanks to you, he’s gone.”
Shelby and Cody stared at each other. It was an old-fashioned standoff so Logan, die-hard peacemaker, went to work. “How ’bout Cody agrees to judge, you agree to dance with him, and I don’t have to haul anyone off to jail?”
Annoying or not, she needed a judge. And Cody, wearing a dark blue button-down, untucked with loose cuffs, and a pair of faded jeans over his boots, looked really damn good. “That sounds fair.”
“Fine.”
“Great.” Logan clapped his hands together for emphasis.
“Yeah, and about that dance,” Gina dragged out, pointing to the table of men Shelby had left waiting. “Mitch was right. You’ll have to wait your turn.” She dug through her purse, handing random items to Logan. “There’s a list in here somewhere.”
“You made a list?” Shelby groaned.
“Ah, hell, Gina,” Logan mumbled. “Do you want me to have to arrest the guy?”
That was all anyone said because right there, in the middle of The B-Cubed, Cody’s mouth covered Shelby’s. He didn’t touch her with anything but his lips, letting them do all the work. And work her mouth they did.
For a second she didn’t respond, started to push him away, tell him she was mad and he had no right to kiss her, but when she opened her mouth he took that as a sign to deepen the kiss, sliding his tongue inside and teasing hers. Shelby made a throaty little noise and curled her fingertips into his shirt.
Good Lord.
Her legs shook like she had sprinted across the entire state of Texas, while he seemed completely relaxed and in control.
Starting to feel a little self-conscious, and a little foolish that she was practically crawling on top of him while his hands hung at his sides, she pushed at his chest. He didn’t budge, still didn’t touch her, but ended the kiss, leaving her achy and unsatisfied.
“What was that?” Shelby asked, touching her lips.
“Me. Closing the damn list.”
“Are you two going to stand there making out all night or are you going to dance?” Gina asked.
“Would you like to dance? Yes? Great.” Cody ignored any lame attempt at a protest she might have conjured up, and led her to the back of the dance floor. Wrapping his arm around her waist, he closed the other hand around hers, bringing it to his heart and holding it there.
Shelby stood rigid, refusing to look at him and doing her best to keep him at a distance. Then he began to sway gently to the music, and Shelby couldn’t help but notice the way their bodies brushed against each other, how she could smell his musky, masculine scent. The song switched and a familiar Rascal Flatts ballad filled the air, bringing with it every feeling she’d ever felt for Cody.
Oh, God, her eyes were filling with tears. She was going to lose it, right there on the dance floor in front of the entire town. And potential judges. Who would want to judge on a panel with a hysterical coordinator? She searched for an escape route, the quickest path from public humiliation to a dark closet where she could bawl in privacy.
“Don’t even think about it. We’re finishing this dance.”
“But you hate dancing,” Shelby whispered, afraid if she spoke too loud he would hear the tears in her voice.
“Not with you.” His voice was gentle and his dark eyes found hers. Slowly, he pulled her up against him and began spinning them on the dance floor. “You and me are going to talk this thing through. Tonight, Shelby Lynn. I’m tired of avoiding this mess.”
Shelby was rendered speechless—did a double take at the determined gleam in his eyes, the absoluteness in his words. For once, Cody wasn’t running. He was standing his ground and forcing a conversation, which in her mind should have happened a week ago, if not ten years ago. But why was he so mad?
“Fine,” Shelby conceded, already overwhelmed by the odds stacked against them, but too tired to argue. “I don’t even know where to start.”
“How about with why the hell you did it? Did you hate me so much that you decided to punish me by keeping my son from me?”
Shelby stopped in the middle of the dance floor. A couple crashed into them but she didn’t notice. She couldn’t have heard him right. He was making it sound like she’d been the one to walk away, not him.
“Don’t stop now,” Cody said, leading her into a simple two-step and apologizing for the pileup they’d created on the dance floor.
Shelby struggled to keep up the pace, convinced she’d still misunderstood his question. “I’m sorry, it’s so loud in here, I think I heard you wrong. What did you say?”
“I wanted to know how you could keep my son from me? How a woman who used to talk about family and love could up and screw my best friend and take off with my kid?”
“Oh, my God.” She’d heard every word that time.
“Nine years, Shelby Lynn!” His eyes were cold and mean now. “You stole nine years from me. And what about JT? How could you do that to your own kid?”
“Me? Don’t you dare blame me,” she snapped, grabbing his arm and dragging him through gawking couples and frozen games of pool. The place wasn’t buzzing with nightlife anymore, as everyone had stopped to ogle and pay witness to a blowup that had been brewing for nearly a decade.
Shelby shoved through the kitchen doors, pushing her way past the staff, Mrs. McKinney, and a pile of flour sacks and cornmeal bags. She stopped by the sink and spun to face him, tired of being pushed around and blamed for everyone else’s problems.
She had never considered that he’d feel betrayed by her choice of husband. At the time she hadn’t even thought he cared. All she could remember was the confusion over his abrupt departure, the fear when he didn’t return, and ultimately the humiliation and heartache. But to accuse
her
of being a bad parent?
“We need some privacy,” she said, her eyes never leaving Cody’s.
Mrs. McKinney blocked the door. “Not until you tell me what you’re going to do about that cheating biddy, Luella Puckett!”
“You get me my privacy or I will say you tainted your own flour and have you publicly disqualified for falsifying information, framing the competition, and using a recipe from the Internet.”
In two seconds flat Mrs. McKinney had the place cleared. Only the hum of the refrigerator and muffled music were left. Cody frowned at Shelby and she frowned back.
“What did you expect me to do, wait for you to grow up?”
“How about letting me be a part of my kid’s life?”
“You were the one who said you weren’t ready for a kid or a wife. I was young and pregnant and scared and
you
bailed. I married Preston because he offered to help me out. I needed a place to live, health coverage for Jake, a way to finish school. He was there for me at a terrifying time. I wanted you—but he was there.”
“That’s bullshit.” His voice was tight, accusation burning through each and every syllable. “I may have bailed that night to gain some perspective, but I came back for you.”
Those five words echoed in her head, and a slow churning began to gnaw at her stomach.
Shelby set her chin. “You’re lying! I waited for months for you.”
“Listen to me, Shelby Lynn. I came back for you,” Cody shouted.
“I don’t believe you.” But even she didn’t believe her own argument anymore. Cody might be a lot of things, but a liar wasn’t one of them.
“Yeah, well I never believed you’d screw my best friend either. Here I came back, ready to grovel, only to find you and Preston looking mighty friendly on the couch.”
This couldn’t be happening. He had to be lying. If not, then her entire world was about to fall apart. Everything she held as truth, had blamed him for, would be wrong.
Suddenly all of it seemed to settle at once. The memory of that night. The way Preston had played on her fears of abandonment, of raising a baby alone. The way Shelby had believed so naively and readily that Cody, the man who had held her when her grandpa died, who had her back when her mom showed up at the funeral wanting nothing more than her share of the miniscule inheritance, who had shared her home, her bed for two years, would walk away.
She was going to be sick.
Shelby’s hands clamped over her mouth, her breathing now coming in hard, painful bursts. Cody swung a stool around and set it behind her. Taking her by the shoulder, he eased her onto it.
“Whoa, breathe,” he said, cupping her cheeks to study her face. She studied back and he looked terrible. Pinched and pale and his hands were shaking. Then his face blurred as black dots pushed in from the sides. “Don’t cry, honey. I’m sorry I yelled.”
But she couldn’t help it. She shook her head, as if the motion would somehow make it all untrue. How could their whole lives, Jake’s life, have been derailed by a misunderstanding?
Because it had been manufactured and calculated.
Shelby drew in a breath, thinking back to that night. She could see it so perfectly. “Oh, Cody. Preston and I never even dated. That night, on the couch, he was holding me because he’d just given me your message. And I didn’t marry Preston until two weeks before Jake was born. Even then I was waiting for you to change your mind, to come back for me. Some days I feel like I’m still waiting.”